


The Boy Who Blocked His Own Shot

by crybabywonu



Category: K-pop, SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-29
Updated: 2019-07-29
Packaged: 2020-07-25 22:23:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20033308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crybabywonu/pseuds/crybabywonu
Summary: Love isn’t easy.





	The Boy Who Blocked His Own Shot

**[nonie🥴- 8:09pm:** _yoooo check this out lmao- ATTACHMENT: 1 IMAGE_**]**

**[nonie🥴- 8:09pm:** _btwbtw are u coming over tonight? chan & kwan are coming, i think a few more people are comin too_**]**

**[soonie🐅- 8:09pm:** _JSJSNS_**]**

**[soonie🐅- 8:10pm:** _sorry dude i can’t make it )):_**]**

**[soonie🐅, 8:10pm:** _hey dude when u get the chance can u check out this choreo?- ATTACHMENT: noon.docx_**]**

**[soonie🐅- 8:11pm:** _night mr. chwe_**]**

**[nonie🥴- 8:12pm:** _good night mr. kwon_**]**

Something felt odd about the conversation, but Vernon couldn’t quite place what it was. Soonyoung wasn’t really the type to say good night, especially this early; add to the fact that they stayed up nearly every night texting, and sending each other memes. Maybe he was reading too much into it.

Even if he was, he now had to call up Mingyu to tell him that everyone cancelled. He felt a little disheartened, they had all been so excited for tonight; and now, it seems like no ones available. He could understand that things come up, so he pushed the feeling aside. At least Chan and Seungkwan were still coming over.

**[kwannie🍊-8:21pm:** _dude soonyoung cancelled???_**] **

**[nonie🥴-8:21pm:** _yeah dog,,, guess it’s us 3 again,,,,, like Always_**]**

**[chan🦖-8:22pm:** _Uh,,, I can’t make it either,, sorry guys_**]**

Bummer. Nearly all hope was lost, until Seungkwan texted him saying he still wanted to hang out, even if everyone else stood them up. Vernon felt that, he really wanted to hang out and have a good time like always. Leave it to Seungkwan to always pull through.

They went out for dinner and a walk around a night time bazaar of sorts. They had a lot of fun, these days it seemed that it was them against the world. They talked about everything going on lately, how they thought it strange that everyone cancelled, Soonyoung’s cryptic message, Chan’s attitude as of late; simply everything. Seungkwan had the brilliant idea that to commemorate the occasion, they get matching necklaces. A symbol of their friendship. They walked around looking for something nice, something that would suit them. When they finally did, they laughed and talked about how dumb they felt; even if it wasn’t dumb. Vernon ironically posted their necklaces on his Instagram story with the tag “friendship goals”, thinking nothing more of it.

That is until Soonyoung posted on his own story, a picture of him and Chan, with the tag “friendship goals”. They were taken aback by this. It felt a little aggressive, if they were being honest. Chan followed suit with his own picture of him and Soonyoung, with the same tag. What were they trying to do? Vernon shook it off, Seungkwan, however, felt there was more to it. On the drive back to Vernon’s place, they talked about how suspicious everything was. It was very confusing why they’d even post that, as if they were mocking Vernon’s picture.

Once back home, Vernon read Soonyoung’s letter disguised as a choreography to Seungkwan. Halfway through, he started crying. Everything was too much, and he didn’t know what to feel. Soonyoung’s words were so sincere, and so warm and nice; Vernon wasn’t sure what he was feeling, or how to process the confession that had been presented to him. It didn’t make him sad, it made him scared. He knew all too well how this would end. He simply couldn’t feel that for Soonyoung, it was very complicated. Now he knew that all the sappy posts Soonyoung commented on, or all the lovey dovey stories were about him. Seungkwan was equally as shocked as Vernon, but he was more worried for him.

_“Dude... What are you going to say to him?”_

_“I don’t know... I don’t know.”_

It wasn’t an easy thing to process. He was touched, he was moved; but that didn’t mean he felt what Soonyoung felt. Not romantically at least. He did love him, as a friend. One he admired, and respected immensely. Platonically, he’d move mountains for Soonyoung. He’d do anything for him. It wasn’t romantic, but it was pure, innocent, real love. He’d grown to have a special place in Vernon’s heart. Now, he had to figure out how not to break his heart. He hated being in this situation, he knew it would be painful regardless of how nice he was.

Seungkwan wouldn’t allow for Vernon to be sad over this, not tonight. He told Vernon that they could deal with it later, when they had more time to think. For now, they could focus their energy on them. They were here, it was still early so they might as well enjoy it. So they did.

They walked around the neighborhood, laughing about nothing and everything. Vernon felt better already, Soonyoung being nothing but an afterthought.

_“What the fuck?!”_ Seungkwan turned his phone over so Vernon could see what was on the screen. It was Soonyoung. With Chan. They were hanging out. They were drinking. Vernon felt hurt, Seungkwan was livid. He was fired up, not necessarily because they were hanging out; but because they had lied. They’d lied, and decided to blow them off. Soonyoung had been a coward, and Chan an accomplice. They were in shock. Vernon felt stupid for having cried over Soonyoung’s words, it made him feel conflicted. It was clear to him that Chan knew about it. The night went on, they were determined to not let it affect them; but it was now a forethought for Vernon. How could he think about anything else? The timing was awful too, they had a final group assignment due on Monday, and they hadn’t even started. They’d deal with it tomorrow. Tonight, Vernon wanted to cry.

Sunday proved to be even worse than Saturday, where the day before had started out fine; Sunday was a bad one right from the beginning.

**[chan🦖-10:32am:** _So you guys don’t give a shit about failing?_**]**

**[kwannie🍊-10:34am:** _we do??? cool it dude_**]**

**[chan🦖-10:35am:** _Well it doesn’t fucking seem like it._**]**

What the fuck was with the attitude? And, as if they were connected telepathically, Seungkwan texted him about it. Why was Chan blaming them if he hadn’t done anything either. It turned into a war. One that Seungkwan and Vernon fought together, and got nothing from. Vernon wound up saying hurtful things to Chan, only after he’d hurt his feelings and proceeded to make him lose his patience entirely. If he was so up in arms about the assignment not being done, he could do it himself. Which only warranted an empty apology from Chan upon realizing that he couldn’t do the work by himself. In the end, Vernon wound up doing the whole thing himself, getting a total of half an hour of sleep in order to get it done. He refused to talk to Chan, it wasn’t like he’d earned forgiveness yet. Not after genuinely hurting his feelings. It wasn’t the first time either, he’d let it slide many times before.

Vernon could hardly concentrate on the work in front of him, though. He still had Soonyoung’s words in his head, eating away at his mind. He decided to write him something too. Something nice and heartfelt, to explain his situation, as complicated as it was.

**[nonie🥴-3:47am:** _hey dude, when you’ve got time can u check out the lyrics to this track i wrote? good night - ATTACHMENT: late night.docx_**]**

Seeing each other around campus and in class proved to be very difficult for Vernon. From the moment he got there he noticed how close Soonyoung and Chan were; how Soonyoung wouldn’t even look at him. It sent a flood of resentment surging through his body. He kept checking if Soonyoung had seen his message already, it just stood at ‘sent’ while Soonyoung was on his phone constantly. Even more resentment followed.

That afternoon when he went home, Seungkwan called him. Chan had the nerve to confront him, and demand an apology. As if he hadn’t laughed at them and insinuated that they were lazy, good for nothings the day before. He even had the nerve to claim Vernon was in the wrong for feeling hurt. Whatever Chan was doing, it wasn’t working. Seungkwan is a lot more reactionary than Vernon is, so the screaming at each other on campus scene was quite an interesting one. He really couldn’t believe it, at this point, Vernon didn’t think Chan could fix their friendship. It would take a lot more than a simple apology to make things better between them.

Regardless, he pushed it all aside; they had even more assignments to get done; and working together seemed to be out of the picture. So, as per usual, Vernon took care of everything. Seungkwan had a valid excuse since he had another individual assignment due, Chan on the other hand, was nowhere to be seen. He only popped in to complain about how they’re not going to get the assignment done on time and how they’re all going to fail. Really helpful. Still he managed- again- to get it done on time.

However, everything was weighing heavy on him. He felt the entire situation with Soonyoung and Chan taking a toll on him, he could only put it off for so long. Vernon checked his phone every five minutes hoping that Soonyoung has at least seen his message. Still nothing. Yet Soonyoung shared meme after meme about how heartbroken he was. How could he? Everything was right there in his letter, maybe he was misunderstanding everything. Maybe, Soonyoung preemptively distanced himself to avoid the heartache and rejection. The real question was _“why?”_. Soonyoung knew that Vernon cared for him dearly. And if he did distance himself purposely, why make it so public? He wasn’t dropping Vernon’s name, but there was simply no chance that his friends didn’t know about it given the replies and comments. Vernon just wanted to understand why. Of course, Seungkwan sent him everything he saw; which Vernon was grateful for, because if he didn’t he’d still be making excuses for Soonyoung.

As much as it hurt to see him blaming all his sadness on him, it was for the best. If that was what Soonyoung chose to put out into the world, and if he chose to paint that picture, then Vernon didn’t want anything to do with it. What isn’t to say a breakup would be worse? It really hurt to be put at the forefront of this heartbreak, unwillingly and without his knowledge.

**[nonie🥴-9:36pm:** _i wanted to talk about this in person, but it’s better if we leave it like this. you go your way i go mine. have a nice life mr. kwon, make the best of it._**]**

**[soonie🐅-10:17pm:** _can i call you?_**]**

Vernon waited, biding his time. He didn’t want to talk over the phone, that wouldn’t help either of them. Instead they agreed to meet the following day on campus to talk. By themselves.

The next morning, after a long night of learning a semester’s worth of statistics, he walked to the library looking for Soonyoung. Vernon sent him a text, telling him where he was. Time crept by, so Vernon listened to music and worked a little more on his still unfinished assignments. It was now nine thirty and there were no signs of Soonyoung anywhere. So Vernon walked out of the building and looked around. He saw Soonyoung in a bench not too far away; he was with Chan, and Mingyu. They were laughing and having a good time, Soonyoung, phone in hand, sat there simply laughing along. To say Vernon was mad would be an understatement. Did Soonyoung not care? How could he be acting like this? Vernon sat himself on a bench at which he could see them, and waited. It had now been an hour since he’d sent Soonyoung that message. He felt a knot in his throat swell, and his vision got blurry. It hurt. Just as he sat there on the verge of tears he looked up to see Chan an Soonyoung walking in his direction, they saw him. They seemed completely taken aback by him given they went behind one of the buildings so they were out of sight. If Vernon wasn’t so emotionally invested in both of them, he would’ve thought they ditched him.

Soon enough, however, Soonyoung emerged from behind the wall. He carried himself like he wasn’t nervous or worried, but his expression and mannerisms said otherwise. Vernon, on the other hand, was angry.

_“What took you so long?”_

_“My phone died, I didn’t see your message. I’m sorry.”_

What a lame excuse.

_“Do you have anything you want to say to me?”_ Vernon was direct, and dry. He wasn’t in the mood for being friendly.

_“Hansol, I love you. I don’t want you out of my life.”_

_“It doesn’t seem like you want me in it, though.”_

_“I’m sorr-“_

_“When you blatantly ignore me, I don’t get the idea that you want me in your life. It gives me the opposite impression, actually. Waiting and waiting, but you won’t even look at me when I pass by. You won’t even wave at me. Nothing, like I don’t exist anymore. I thought I made things clear in my letter. I want to be your friend, I love you as a friend.”_

_“But, I don’t want to be just your friend. Every since I met you, you’ve been all I can think about. I love everything about you, and we’ve got so much in common. Whenever you talked about something I didn’t know I’d look it up to understand you. You’re funny. You’re all I’ve ever wanted.”_ There was a tone of desperation in Soonyoung’s voice. He was beginning to choke up. Vernon’s anger dissipated, and was replaced with sadness and stress instead.

_“You know we can’t be together. I don’t love you that way. I wouldn’t want to hurt you. That isn’t my intent. I value you so much as my friend,” _a small sob interrupted his sentence, _“I don’t want to lose you. You’re so important to me, please understand that some things aren’t meant to be.”_

_“It doesn’t have to end like it always does, you know. We don’t have t-“_

_“Soonyoung, it always ends up like that. You think that it won’t but it will. We’ll date, you’ll realize I don’t love you, and you’ll be hurt. You’ll want to hold my hand, and I won’t let you. You’ll want to hold me, and I won’t let you. You have to realize that dating me won’t make me love you, and you’ll only be in love with the idea of me. I can’t love you like you want. Like you deserve. You deserve more than a one sided relationship. You deserve someone who can actually love you. And I can’t love you how you want.”_

Vernon broke at that moment, why can’t Soonyoung understand? He was crying, hard. The idea of losing a friend so close to him was genuinely upsetting.

_“Please, Hansol, we can try it out and if it doesn’t work I won’t hold it against you. I won’t hate you. I don’t hate you.”_

_“You don’t, but you will.”_ He stood, grabbing his things. Not looking at him once. _“I should leave.”_

So he did, without looking back. He sat in a corner of the library where no one would find him or hear him cry. It was a bitter end, and a depressing goodbye to someone he wanted around for a long time. Vernon couldn’t help but feel guilt crawling up his body. Invading him, like a leech. He felt sick, his head spinned. He texted Seungkwan to tell him, he told him everything that was said. Seungkwan said he’d be there as soon as possible.

Vernon cut all ties with Soonyoung. It didn’t do him any good to blame himself for what happened; as Seungkwan had put it, if he couldn’t see him as anything more than a friend, then they were never really friends to begin with. Still, as helpful as that was, Vernon kept feeling a twinge of pain and guilt every time he saw Soonyoung comment on memes about heartbreak on his timeline, blaming “someone” for feeling like utter shit and absolutely worthless. It hurt to see him think that Vernon didn’t care, or that he didn’t love him. Sure it wasn’t romantic, but platonic love is just as important and meaningful. He constantly remembered every good day they’d had together, all the times they went out, inside jokes; everything. It was all tainted. It didn’t bring him joy, it only brought him heartache.

Then, all of Soonyoung’s skeletons came out of the closet. He’d told his friends a different version if events; in his, they dated. Vernon was his ex-boyfriend, who dumped him because he no longer cared or loved him. To say Vernon didn’t cry when he found out would be a lie. He had no right. Then it happened. The fateful meme accusing Vernon of being very expensive to Soonyoung. Apparently he was still in debt over things he did for Vernon. Not only that, but their “friends” clowning him, agreeing with Soonyoung, taking pity on him.

‘You don’t hurt those you claim to love.’

Blocking Soonyoung wasn’t the easiest or the absolute happiest thing, but he had to for the sake of his own mental health. Which Soonyoung noticed right away. Vernon felt he needed to give him one last chance at redemption. So he texted him before blocking his number.

**[nonie🥴-9:08pm:** _ “let’s not be immature” so lets talk._ **]**

**[soonie🐅-10:56pm:** _🤔 hey? how are you?_**]**

**[nonie🥴-10:57pm:** _not good, but that isnt the point. the point is, u dont know why i blocked you do you?_**]**

**[soonie🐅-10:57pm:** _You blocked me? what’s up with that_**]**

What? Why was he acting dumb? He really doesn’t care at all.

**[nonie🥴-10:58pm: ** _you know, talking to you was a mistake._ **]**

**[soonie🐅-10:59pm:** 😢**]**

**[nonie🥴-11:00pm:** _i like that you deem this as important as i do._**]**

**[soonie🐅-11:00pm:** _Well it is important_**]**

It felt like a cruel fucking joke. One last chance at fixing everything, and he was acting like this? Fuck it, fuck him.

**[nonie🥴-11:02pm:** _it isnt. and i know it._**]**

**[soonie🐅-11:03pm:** _Do you want to talk about something? And it is important to me_**]**

**[soonie🐅-11:03pm: ** _If you want I’ll call you, you tell me._ **]**

**[nonie🥴-11:05pm: ** _no._ **]**

**[soonie🐅-11:05pm: ** _Okay, that’s fine_ **]**

**[nonie🥴-11:06: ** _goodbye._ **]**

He felt pathetic for crying about it, but it was just so obvious that Soonyoung didn’t want him around anymore. Since they couldn’t date, there wasn’t a point to trying in Soonyoung’s eyes. It’s the only way Vernon could make sense of it. Otherwise, it was all so inconsistent.

It hurt to have to say goodbye to him that way, but there was no other choice. It hurt seeing someone who you love and who claimed to love you, turn so bitter towards you. Vernon didn’t want to put up with the humiliation and character assassination taking place for something that wasn’t his fault.

A bitter end to something so sweet. Something that Vernon would bare in mind next time anyone wanted to get that close to him. He still wished Soonyoung all the best, he only hoped Soonyoung did the same for him.

**Author's Note:**

> Based on true events.


End file.
